Reprieve
by Herr Wozzeck
Summary: After the storm, there is a chance to breathe for everyone involved. Isaac and Ellie find themselves picking up the remaining pieces together on the EarthGov gunship after escaping the Sprawl. Oneshot. Friendship.


_A/N: Hey guys. It's Herr Wozzeck here._

_So I got some Dead Space 2 jiggies for... some reason. I don't really know why, but... well, I thought I'd provide you all with some friendship fics to go around. So yeah._

_For disclaimers... Dead Space 2 doesn't belong to me. It belongs to the peeps at Visceral Games and EA Games._

_So yeah... I listened to the Intermezzo from Puccini's Manon Lescaut a lot while writing this, so I suggest you guys do the same before reading this. You can listen to it here: www. youtube. com/watch?v=XJ06-y3ErjY_

_I... really don't have that much to say, so here we go._

* * *

**Reprieve**

_A Dead Space 2 Oneshot_

"What?"

The question was a welcome change from what Isaac Clarke had been used to for... hell, how long had it been now? Three years? Three years of nonstop hell. First, on the Ishimura with the first Necromorph outbreak. Then, spending three years in a near-constant state of being drugged up while being haunted by visions of Nicole. And then, when that ended, being thrust smack in the middle of a huge outbreak on Titan Station.

It had been a hell of a journey, he realized- and one he would sooner forget than tell any grandchildren he had.

But now, sitting in the EarthGov gunship he had somehow managed to escape the exploding station on, he had come to a strange epiphany.

For the first time in three years, he felt he was actually safe.

And for the first time in three years, he was not alone. He looked to the seat next to him on the gunship, seeing Ellie Langford looking at him with her one remaining eye. There was something strangely comforting about the presence of the friend he had picked up during the outbreak on the Sprawl: even after Isaac had essentially forced her to flee the Sprawl, she had come back to rescue him from the exploding station. It had been a strange feeling to have someone come help him for once: he could barely keep count of how many people had eventually screwed him over in the end. First Kendra on the Ishimura, then the staff of the asylum on the Sprawl, then Daina at the Church of Unitology, and finally Nolan Stross.

And here was someone who broke that mold.

A friend.

Isaac turned his attention back to the vacuum of space in front of him, letting out a relieved sigh. "Nothing," he replied. "I was just... thinking... The last time I wound up in this situation, a lot of messed up shit went down."

Ellie glanced to the side, a curious look coming on her face. "I guess you're talking about what happened on the Ishimura?" she asked. "I don't think you need to tell me the whole story about that."

The engineer's hand shifted its position slightly as he shook his head. "No kidding," he mentioned. "It's... not a story I'd want to talk about, anyway. I didn't think those... _things_... would follow me all the way here..." He sighed softly.

"Tough bunch of years?" asked the only other person on the gunship. "You can't have been fighting those things for all those years, though."

"I wasn't," replied Isaac, leaning back against the back of his seat. "I... don't think I want to talk about that right now..." He looked to Ellie. "Well, we survived the Sprawl. What do we do now?"

"Well... I guess we wait," she said. "We don't... really have a choice, do we?"

"I guess not," said the other survivor, looking there. "We could try to get back to Earth, but this gunship doesn't have any form of faster than light travel, and I can't rig one from here. So our only option is to wait for someone. I hope it's not an EarthGov ship. They'll probably arrest us both."

"Don't say that!" said Ellie, looking right at Isaac. "They'll understand, right? We only got out of here, and..."

Isaac shook his head. "I already know about the Marker, Ellie," he replied. "And you heard what they said about the Ishimura. We already know too much. We... may not be able to get out of this as easily as I hoped..."

The only other survivor in the ship glanced down, one of her pigtails shifting slightly against her shoulder as she did. "So much for that idea," she said. "So we just sit here and wait then?"

"I... don't know," said Isaac. "What _can _we do?"

"Not a whole lot..." agreed Ellie. "I guess we just wait for someone to pick us up and pray it's not an EarthGov ship then." She let out a sigh. "Some plan."

Isaac chuckled bitterly. "I know," he said, looking away from the woman he was sitting next to.

Neither person said anything for a while. The reality of their situation seemed to hit them just then. It was a reality neither of them wanted to really deal with right then and there, but... they had no choice. So they contemplated their fate in silence, Isaac and Ellie both looking quite grim as they realized just how bad their situation was.

Finally, Ellie turned to the engineer. "Well, it's the only thing we've got, as you said," she replied, manipulating a few controls. "I guess... we just sit here until someone finds us, then. _If _someone finds us..."

Isaac nodded grimly, tapping his hand against the arm rest of the seat he was in and then closing his eyes. He found that sleep came easy for him for the first time in a long while.

* * *

When he woke up, he was still in the seat he had fallen asleep in. Groaning, he sat up, taking a deep breath as he felt Ellie's gaze fall on him.

"First time you've really had sleep?" asked Ellie.

"Yeah," replied Isaac as he opened his eyes. "Feels kind of nice, I guess."

"Can't say I blame you there," she said, looking at the dials in front of her. "I figured you deserved your rest after all the crap that happened back on the Sprawl." She looked ahead into the vast expanse of space. "You know... we never really did get to talk all that much on the Sprawl."

"We didn't," agreed Isaac. "There was a lot happening back then."

"Yeah," she said. "You seemed gone for... long stretches of time whenever you left Stross and I behind."

Isaac nodded. "Even on the Sprawl, I can't stop finding logs from what happened during the outbreak," he mentioned. "It's like someone keeps on placing them there for me to find." Isaac nodded at Ellie. "I... I even found a couple of audio logs from your unit."

The woman froze, looking at Isaac in shock. "You... You found some logs of theirs?" she asks.

"Yeah," replied Isaac. "Most of them were recorded by this man... Kaleb, I think his name was. I-"

The engineer paused when he saw Ellie turn away sharply. Almost instantly, he recognized the look she had given him just before she turned away. And instantly, he regretted having brought up Kaleb. He glanced away, his shoulders sagging slightly.

"I..." said Isaac. "I... shouldn't have brought that up. I'm sorry."

He heard a sniffle come from Ellie, her left hand coming onto her face as her fingertips settled somewhere in the roots of one of her pigtails. All the engineer got from Ellie was another soft sniffle before she came up, wiping what Isaac guessed was a tear before she turned even further away.

"No, it's fine," said Ellie. "I just..." The woman sniffled yet again before focusing on the view of space in front of her. "We got... close, I guess..." She shook her head. "There... I just don't know why... why _him_, you know...?"

Isaac glanced to the resident of what used to be the Sprawl as she wiped her own tears from her eyes. It was when she rubbed her eyes that he noticed a small detail on her right wrist he hadn't really noticed before. He saw what looked like a Unitology bracelet on her wrist. That she was wearing such a thing surprised Isaac, and stirred an old resentment in him.

However, he did not dwell on it long, for he knew better than that. He and Ellie had both just helped each other survive a massive necromorph outbreak. They were both the only company they had for each other. And Isaac had gotten to know Ellie's determination quite a bit over the course of the past several hours. For that, Isaac decided it was better not to follow up on that until she felt more comfortable.

Instead, he glanced to the panel in front of him before turning in his seat and standing up. "I'm..." Isaac hesitated, watching as Ellie let in a shaky breath to calm herself. "I'm sorry I brought that up."

"It's fine," she said. "I was honestly hoping someone would find any trace of where he had been on the Sprawl. Where did you find these logs?"

"They were scattered around," replied Isaac. "I think I found the last one when I had to leave the tram that time before the Ishimura." He paused, thinking about how he was going to word his next sentence. He took a deep breath, looking away from Ellie. "I... It was a brave thing for him to do, sacrificing himself for your sake."

"And he died because of it," Ellie replied bitterly. "I just... I don't know, Isaac. It doesn't feel like what he did was a brave thing..." She closed her good eye, letting out a sigh as she did. "I just... I'd rather not talk about this now."

"Fair enough," said the engineer. "I... should probably take care of some other things around here. Like check how much food and water we have here."

"Already did that," said Ellie. "We should have enough water to give us two days. Three if we ration it right. Food is another story, though: we don't quite have enough to sustain us that long."

Isaac nodded. "I see," he said. "Well, it's better than nothing. It'll at least keep us in check until a ship gets here."

"That it will," agreed Ellie. "Anything else you need to check on?"

"I... I think we'll need some form of oxygen filter," he said. "I'm... going to see what I can do with that. I'll be busy for the next few hours. You should probably get some sleep yourself."

"Yeah, you're right," she said, yawning as she curled up. "Try not to wake me up with... however you plan to filter the air in here."

Isaac nodded. "Hopefully, it won't be that difficult."

* * *

A few hours of tweaking later, and Isaac Clarke was met with success. He of course tried to be as quiet as he could, though in some events this was much easier said than done.

He stood up, looking at his work and nodding. It had been a tough job given that the only tools available were rather... ineffective for the job he needed them for. But he had managed, he knew. And now, the air filtration was going at a steady pace. It would be enough to keep them alive for however long it took for someone to find them. It had just come down to adjusting a few things in the present air recycling system, after all.

He looked to Ellie as he walked back to the front of the gunship, the woman only then stirring as she opened her eyes. She shook her head, noticing Isaac right as he sat down next to her.

"Bad dreams?" he asked.

"Yeah," replied Ellie, letting out a displeased groan. "I dreamed about the Sprawl." She shook her head, letting out a particularly distraught sigh. "About... those _things_. I don't want to think about what they did to my friends... I just saw them die over and over again..."

Isaac nodded, letting out a solemn sigh. "I got the same way after the Ishimura," he said. "But... I don't remember any of them."

"Why not?" asked Ellie.

The engineer glanced to the side uncertainly. "I... I was actually kept in an asylum for the three years between the Ishimura and then."

Ellie jolted in surprise in her seat. "You're kidding!" she said.

"I wish I was," said Isaac. "I was fed so much memory loss medication that those years are a blur. I can't remember one detail from then that sticks out at me, you know?"

"Wow, you weren't kidding when you said EarthGov thought you knew too much," Ellie replied. "If they put you _there _for all those years..." She shook her head, glancing to the side. "Must've been hell. I guess it's a good thing you don't remember most of it."

"I guess," replied the engineer. "Though, to be honest, I do remember that I _was _seeing hallucinations for some of that time. They were so vivid, but I knew they weren't real."

"Probably all the drugs they pumped into you," Ellie replied, giving a dismissive hand wave.

"No, it was more than that," said Isaac. "I..." The engineer glanced to the side. It was then that a critical question came to mind: should he tell Ellie what the Marker had done to his mind? He knew what had happened to his mind, but he was not sure he should tell Ellie. Finally, he glanced to the side. "I don't know what it was. But I don't think it was just the drugs."

Ellie shrugged. "Whatever you say," she replied. "Still, it proves EarthGov _really _wants this covered up. I mean, they put you in an asylum! Is that even _legal_?"

"I don't know," replied Isaac. "And I don't care to find out. I guess I'm just glad they didn't try to kill me at first sight. Though... I guess they kind of did at first."

"Really?" asked the woman. "Why?"

"Long story," said Isaac. "It was on the Ishimura. I was part of a response team sent there to take care of whatever issues had come up. We had a soldier with us and some Kendra Daniels. I found out much later that she was an EarthGov agent trying to get the Marker that was on Aegis VII away from the _Ishimura_ to... somewhere else. She left me to die because I knew too much."

"I see..." said Ellie. "What happened to her?"

"_She _ended up dying before she could get away from Aegis VII," he replied. "It's ironic, really. I was the only one to get off that rock, and I was the one she wanted to kill to keep this from getting out."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," said Ellie, nodding. "I'm just glad I didn't have anyone attempt that on me while I was at the Sprawl."

Isaac glanced at the bandage over Ellie's eye. "Stross almost killed you, you know," he mentioned.

"Yeah, but I don't think he was trying to keep me quiet," she replied. "I guess all things considered, we both got off relatively lucky."

The engineer could only nod as Ellie stood up from her chair. She walked further back in the gunship, neither of them speaking as she did.

* * *

"Do you think there are other places with Necromorph outbreaks going on right now?"

Ellie asked this question rather suddenly as she turned to face Isaac several hours later. The engineer had stood up by then, and was stretching his legs when the question came from nowhere.

Isaac paused at the question, blinking at the stars outside of the gunship's window. "You think there's more?" he asked.

"Well, you said there was a government-created Marker on Aegis VII, and then there was the Marker at the Sprawl," mentioned Ellie. "There could be more, you know..."

The engineer looked at Ellie from where he stood deeper in the ship. "You're right," he said. "I... I don't even want to think about that..."

Ellie nodded. "I know," she said. "I was just curious. I know I haven't thought about it much either."

"Then why'd you ask?" Isaac asked, crossing his arms.

"I don't know," said the woman as she put her hands in her lap. "It's just... the thought of it terrifies me. What if there are more people just like everyone on the Sprawl? What if they're all just as confused as I was... I... I don't want to think about it, but it just can't escape my mind... It's just so horrible..."

Isaac nodded solemnly as Ellie looked away. "I guess you're right," he mentioned. "And it could happen anywhere without any warning... That..." He also glanced to the side. "That's also really bad."

Neither of them said anything for a short while, both of them looking away from each other. After a few seconds, Ellie turned to the engineer. "I guess I shouldn't think about it," she says. "I'm just... frustrated. I don't really know why."

"If there is another outbreak..." He let out a sigh as he turned to Ellie. He didn't say anything, letting the possibilities speak for themselves. He simply walked back to the front of the ship, leaning against the chair he had used earlier.

It was Ellie who spoke next. "Yeah, it's not worth thinking about," she said. "If there is another outbreak, we'll probably be at the center of it again. And I'm not sure how that'll happen."

"You know how these are, Ellie," said Isaac. "They'll spread really fast, before anyone can do anything about them. We'll just have to see..."

"Yeah, I guess," she says. "Let's hope there aren't any other outbreaks."

Isaac nodded in reply. "It's the only thing we can do."

And the two were silent yet again.

* * *

A few more hours passed by in silence, and after that, a day or two where the silence between them settled into something more or less accepted as part of the daily routine. They spoke every so often, sometimes Isaac or Ellie would get a drink of water and something to eat, and life seemed to pass by as usual. Isaac would check the filtration systems every so often, and Ellie would make sure the ship was still functional. So for the two of them, life went on as usual.

Well, as usual as it could be for having just survived a necromorph outbreak, anyway.

Finally, Isaac's curiosity over Ellie's Unitology bracelet got the better of him.

"I notice you've got a Unitology bracelet," he finally mentioned

Ellie glanced over at Isaac as he turned in his seat to look at the other C.E.C. worker. Her hand then darted back to the bracelet on her right wrist, nodding. "Yeah," she says. "It was a gift from Kaleb. He had joined the church about a month ago." Ellie shrugged. "He wanted me to join, too, but... I felt a little uncertain about it. I told him I would think about it."

"It's a good thing you didn't join," said Isaac, glancing to the side. "They would've corrupted you. They're crazy."

"Kaleb seemed fine," replied Ellie. "He did have some... pretty bad things to say about it actually. He complained about how they asked him to pay money he never had to get more knowledge of what was happening in the church at any given time."

Isaac nodded. "It's how they rope you in," he admitted. "My mother... she was a devout Unitologist. I had been selected to go to a prestigious school... but she sold all of our assets to the Church of Unitology. It cost me my chance to go there." The engineer frowned. "And then there's the whole business with the Marker. The highest level Unitologists are all about the Marker."

"I guess you had some bad experiences with that?" asked Ellie.

"Right before I ran into you, actually," replied Isaac, crossing his arms. "I had been... locked up for three years, right up until the start of this past outbreak. And then when that began, I was released by someone named Daina. She told me to meet up with her so we could get off." He shook his head. "It was a trap. I knew something was off about it the minute she asked me to enter the Church of Unitology on the Sprawl. She wanted me to make _more_ of those Markers."

"And unleash more hell like that on people everywhere?" asked the other survivor. "You're right, they _are _crazy." She looked at the bracelet. "I guess it's a good thing Kaleb never got that far."

"I think so too," said Isaac. "I found a text log in the Church of Unitology. It mentioned something about... indoctrination centers? I don't know, and I don't want to think they actually had those. But I wouldn't be surprised if they did."

"I guess I'm glad I didn't join, then," she mentioned. "Who knows what would've happened if I had joined...?" She looked at the Unitology bracelet, her eyes misting over with nostalgia. "I miss Kaleb," she admitted finally. "I... I don't think I want to get rid of this just yet. It's the only thing of his I have left..."

The engineer didn't say anything for a few seconds, turning his attention to the control panel. After a minute or so, he nodded. "Keep the bracelet, then." The statement came out softly. "I... won't hold it against you."

Ellie nodded, but she felt that Isaac had forced himself to say it. "Are you sure?" she asked.

"I'm sure," he replied. "You look like you need a memento of Kaleb. And you need it regardless of what I feel about the Church of Unitology." He turned his attention back to Ellie. "Besides... It'll be better for you in the long run. It's... really bad, trying to remember a lost loved one when you don't have anything you can remember them fondly with."

"I guess you've been there?" Ellie asked.

Isaac simply nodded, closing his eyes as Nicole came to his mind again. There was nothing left but a memory of what used to be before Nicole had killed herself on the Ishimura, now that he had effectively killed her hallucination on the Sprawl. There was... a hole there, exactly as he had feared would happen if he had ever truly let go of Nicole.

He nodded. "Yeah," he said. "It's... a long story."

"You feel like talking about it?" asked Ellie.

The engineer paused, looking back at the woman he was with. There was something about her that reminded her of Nicole for a brief second. He couldn't quite place it, but... It was there, nevertheless. He figured he'd find out how she reminded her of his dead girlfriend soon enough.

"I... think so," he replied. "It's a long tale, so..."

"We've got time," said Ellie.

Isaac nodded. "Then I guess that settles it," he said as Ellie moved a little closer, sitting against the wall opposite where Isaac was.

"Her name was Nicole Brennan..."

And so Isaac recounted the entire history of how he had met and come to love Nicole Brennan. It was a rather long story, but Ellie listened intently, never once saying anything. As he went on, a part of him realized it actually felt good to talk about Nicole and the many times they spent together after he had began his CEC career. It felt good to just tell someone about Nicole, about how truly wonderful she had been. He could not exactly place why it felt so good; he only knew that it did.

Ellie shifted in her seat as he came to the rather difficult part where she went onto the Ishimura. "She had been given a position on the Ishimura shortly after that," said Isaac, continuing on. "It... was a really good position for her. It had her do the kind of thing she loved to do, you know? I told her she should do it. She always came first, you know." He hung his head slightly. "And then the necromorph outbreak happened there. Nicole... she killed herself before I could even get there. Injected herself with a poisonous compound..." Isaac glanced to the side. "And the worst part was, I didn't even realize it until I had basically gotten off the ship."

The other survivor nodded. "I'll bet you felt pretty guilty about that," she replied.

"In a lot of ways," Isaac said, taking a deep breath as he closed his eyes. "I... I blamed myself for her death for the longest time. If I had known..." He shakes his head, his eyebrows arcing downwards. "That's a bad excuse. There's no way any of us could've known what was going to happen on the Ishimura."

"Especially not you," replied Ellie. "Are you sure you're all right?"

Isaac looked out to the vast expanse of space, thinking about Nicole yet again. She was the only think that he had left after the events of the Ishimura. It had plagued him on his years aboard the Sprawl, even if he had a difficult time remembering most of it, especially when he could never let her go. Finally letting her go when the Marker tried to use her as a way to get Isaac to merge with it had been the hardest thing in his life.

But now that he was here with Ellie... He had a friend, at least. He was not going to be completely alone, at least.

"I... I think I'll manage," he replied, turning back to his only companion on the small gunship. "Thanks for asking."

Ellie nodded, blinking as her hand migrated to the bandage over her missing eye, pointing at it briefly. "You know, you still owe me that eye," she stated.

"I... don't know if I can do anything about that," replied the engineer candidly. "But I'll see what I can do. I'm sorry about Stross, by the way."

"It's fine," she said. "I think we were all so concentrated on getting out of the Sprawl it just crept up on him." She frowned then. "You said he died..."

"He attacked me some time after you lost your eye," admitted Isaac. "He tried to do the same thing to me that he did to you. If he had been successful... I probably wouldn't be standing here. I don't really know." The engineer paused, both people looking in front of them. "You know, I wonder what would've happened if he hadn't tried to attack me... if we had been able to get him to calm down."

"So do I," said Ellie, glancing behind them at the space Stross could have occupied if he had still been alive. "I think it's for the best, though. He was insane."

Isaac shook his head. "That's not good enough for me," said the engineer plainly. "If there had been a way to help him... I would've done it." He let out a sigh. "I just can't stand the thought that I ultimately had to kill him. He could've gotten off too..."

"And what would we have done then?" asked Ellie as she crossed her arms. "I'm not saying we should've left him behind, but... what would he have done if we brought him here? And how would we have calmed him down? I don't really think you have an answer to that."

Isaac inhaled, nodding. "No," he admitted. "But there must have been something we could do..." He let out a sigh, his hand clenching into a fist briefly before releasing it.

"Maybe," said Ellie, pulling her legs closer to her torso. "It doesn't hurt to hope, I guess..."

Neither of them said anything else for a few seconds. Isaac glanced down at the floor, his hands placed squarely on his thighs as he tried to think of something to say. Finally, he looked at Ellie.

"I... I've been thinking just now," he said. "If I hadn't run into you on the Sprawl... where would we be now?"

The woman shrugged. "I guess I'd be dead," she said. "And I guess you'd still be running around the Sprawl trying to stop Tiedemann from using the Marker for... whatever he wanted to use it for."

Isaac nodded at this. "I guess we couldn't have gotten this far without each other," he said. "I... thanks. For everything."

Ellie nodded as well. "If anything, I should be thanking _you_," she said. "So... thanks."

They sat in silence for a little longer after this, neither one saying anything. Finally, Ellie curled up against the wall, closing her eyes as she took a nap for the second time that day.

* * *

"It's been a few days, you know."

Isaac nodded, looking out to see a ship coming into view. "Yeah, it has," he said, nodding sadly as he looked on. "I guess our ship is finally here. We just have to hope it's not EarthGov."

"Knowing them, it probably will be EarthGov," replied Ellie, sighing heavily. She turned to Isaac then, blinking as she did. "I guess I should be thankful we're both still alive."

"I guess so too," replied Isaac, taking a deep breath as he drummed his fingers against the arm rest of his seat. "Though knowing what might come up next... we may become wanted for the rest of our lives, you know..."

Ellie nodded grimly as she gave a smile to the man sitting next to her. "We'll just have to hope for the best, right?" she asked.

"Yeah," said Isaac. "Ellie... in case we get separated later, I just wanted to tell you... You've been a good friend to me these past few days."

The woman nodded. "You took the words right out of my mouth," she said. "You've been a good friend too, Isaac. We've been through a lot." She glanced to the side, noticing the comm unit on the gunship lighting up. "If we wind up in the same cell block, I'll try and find you."

"Hopefully then we can talk," said Isaac.

The comm unit crackled to life shortly after.

* * *

**The End**

* * *

_A/N: And that's that for this oneshot._

_So yeah. I am _not _going to go with Isaac and Ellie developing love here. To me, the way their relationship plays out in DS2, it's more like they become close friends than they do lovers. Besides, I don't think Ellie would move on from Kaleb so quickly, do you? And Isaac especially, though he did technically just get over Nicole. So I decided to go with the really good friends angle of writing about their relationship, you know? Felt more natural that way._

_Anyway, stuff happened here... and I left it ambiguous for a reason. You'll see why sometime in the near future._

_Once again, I recommend you listen to the Intermezzo from Puccini's _Manon Lescaut_, and I hope you guys enjoyed this oneshot!_

_-Herr Wozzeck_


End file.
